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Folland Gnat T.1 (A02105) 1:72 Airfix The Gnat was a developmental evolution of the earlier Midge that Folland had worked on without Government sponsorship as a small light-weight fighter of simple construction that would be easily made without massively specialised and expensive tooling. The Gnat kept to this ethos, and although it didn't find favour with the Ministry of Supply as a fighter, it did find a niche as a jet trainer. Elsewhere it was used as a fighter and trainer, but its most high-profile use that gave it a lasting place in the heart of many aviation enthusiasts was as the aircraft of choice for the Red Arrows until their replacement by the BAe Hawk T.1 in 1979. As a trainer with the RAF it served from 1965, allowing pilots to get up to speed with fast jets before being streamed into their eventual speciality. At the end of 1978 the drawdown of Gnat airframes reached critical mass, with the unwanted aircraft being sold on to other operators, private or otherwise. India built single seat F.1 Gnats under license as the HAL Ajeet, as well as the more familiar two-seat trainers, although they were quite different to those used by the RAF. There are still plenty of Gnats on display in museums where they don’t take up much room, and three are often seen in the skies at UK airshows, which is a lovely sight, especially as one flies in the Yellow Jacks colours, another as a Red Arrow, and the third in trainer red/white/grey. The Kit This is a reboxing of the 2012 tooling by the (then) recently reinvigorated Airfix under Hornby’s ownership, which replaced the original tooling that is probably older than most of us. It arrives in a small top-opening red-themed box with the lid taped down. Inside are two sprues of grey styrene, a separately bagged sprue of clear parts, decal sheet and instruction booklet that is printed in colour with the decal profiles on the rear pages. Detail is good, and it extends into the cockpit and gear bays, a huge improvement over the old tooling. Construction begins with the rear seat, which is the early Folland version with the tubular “shoulders”, which is fitted to the rear bulkhead and joined to the floor, along with two control columns and the front seat after attaching it to its bulkhead, adding the rear instrument panel to the back of it, applying the dial decal once everything is painted. The front panel is similarly appointed with a nice decal, and both are without a coloured background, so you can paint the panel without having to match colours. The fuselage halves have the intake lips added to the outside, and the trunking is installed from within after painting the interior silver. Those inserts have the rear cockpit sidewalls moulded into them to match the front sidewalls that are moulded into the fuselage halves. The main gear bays are installed from within, adding the gear legs if you are planning on posing your model gear down, using just the bays for the gear up option. Both legs have their captive bay doors fitted to the front of the legs, although these and probably the legs could be left off until after main painting is completed. The fuselage can be closed around the cockpit once the sidewalls are painted, and there is some space for nose weight even though the instructions don’t mention any. After dealing with the seams, there is a choice of two inserts that fill in the space between the main gear bays, one with the bay doors moulded-in for gear up, and another without for gear down, drilling out the flashed-over holes from within if you are using the Airfix stands that are available separately. For gear up, the nose gear has a bay door inserted, or the strut with twin wheels and bay door for gear down. The main gear wheels are fitted to the axles at a 5° angle to the vertical, as shown in the accompanying scrap diagrams, which also show the angles of the bay spats. The upper wings are full span and include a section of the top fuselage and spine, fitting the lower wing halves after drilling out the holes for the almost ubiquitous slipper tanks. The wings fit over the fuselage, the elevators slot into the sides of the tail, and an exhaust can is inserted into the rear of the fuselage, and although it’s shown painted in gunmetal, you might want to check your references. The two slipper tanks are made from two halves plus a rounded nose, and careful fitting should simplify clean-up of the seams later. They fix to the holes drilled in the underwings, then you can choose whether to use the two identical pilot figures before gluing the canopy over the cockpit. The final parts are a pair of blade antennae on the spine, and you should check your references for their angles from the front. If memory serves, at least one is not vertical. The comparatively enormous probe inserts into a slot below the clear nose light to finish the build. Markings There are two decal options on the sheet, one of which is firmly based in the real world, the other based on fever dreams from a Hollywood script-writer’s pen. From the box you can build one of the following: Folland Gnat T.1 No.4 Flying Training School, RAF Valley, Anglesey, Wales, 1970 Oscar EW-5894 Fallus Tactical Fighter Bomber, USS Essess, Mediterranean/Gulf, 1991 Decals are by Cartograf, which is a guarantee of good registration, sharpness and colour density, with a thin gloss carrier film cut close to the printed areas. Just in case you missed the reference, the second decal option is from the comedy movie Hot Shots that was released in 1991, and was so well-liked that it was followed by a sequel Hot Shots Part Deux in 1993. It has ‘The Navy’ writ large on the sides of the nose, and a ring of fake rocket apertures painted on the slipper tanks to give it a more aggressive look for the movie. Conclusion The Gnat is a small aircraft in the flesh, and is almost too wee in 1:72, but the model has plenty of detail moulded-in. The second decal option made me smile too. Highly recommended. Review sample courtesy of